


not brave enough to lose you

by playedwright



Category: Autoboyography - Christina Lauren
Genre: Acceptance, Feelings, Fluff, Growing Up, M/M, Sebastian Centric, tbh i don't know how to describe this sooooo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 02:37:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15233481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/playedwright/pseuds/playedwright
Summary: He is four years old, and Sebastian Brother knows what love means.Love is the way his father holds his mother’s hand when they take walks through the neighborhood. It is the way his mother’s face softens when his father is up at the pulpit bearing his testimony. It’s the way he felt when he found out he was going to be an older brother, and it’s the way he felt when he held his baby sister in his arms for the first time. Love is the way his mother tucks him in every night and kisses his forehead three times, and it’s the way his father’s head bows in concentration as he prays.*In which Sebastian is many things, but above all he is someone who feels deeply, and who grows.





	not brave enough to lose you

**Author's Note:**

> there simply isn't enough fic in this tag, and i intend to fix that — even if the things i write turn out sadder than i intend them to be.

iv.   
  
He is four years old, and Sebastian Brother knows what love means.   
  


Love is the way his father holds his mother’s hand when they take walks through the neighborhood. It is the way his mother’s face softens when his father is up at the pulpit bearing his testimony. It’s the way he felt when he found out he was going to be an older brother, and it’s the way he felt when he held his baby sister in his arms for the first time. Love is the way his mother tucks him in every night and kisses his forehead three times, and it’s the way his father’s head bows in concentration as he prays.   
  
It is the way Sebastian feels at the closing of a prayer, and it’s the warmth that settles in his heart and the trust in a being he can’t see but feels like he knows.

  
  


  
  


vi.   
  
He is six and a half years old, and he knows what love means.   
  
Love means making friends on a playground and holding the hand of a kid who was just as frightened as Sebastian was on his first day. It’s playing tag in the dirt and his friends’ laughter in the air, and it’s the smile on his face when he brings home his drawing from school. It’s the magnet that holds up every last piece of Sebastian’s valuable art.   
  
It’s the way Lizzie turns to him for everything and it’s her eyes, even when they fill with tears.   
  
It’s having a playground crush, and it’s Sebastian telling his friends that crushes mean love and love mean kisses.   
  
It is not the sinking feeling in his chest when his parents sit him down, at six and a half years old, to tell him that boys can’t kiss other boys. It is not the way he feels like crying when they tell him he can’t kiss Ammon Donaldson because boys don’t have crushes on other boys, boys have crushes on girls and that’s the way it is.   
  
It’s the way Lizzie crawls into his bed that night and curls against his chest, young and clueless to the world around her but somehow knowing he needed the company.   
  
It is the way that his heart feels when he prays, and when he opens his eyes and feels in his heart that he is okay.   
  
  


  
  


viii.   
  
He is eight years old, and he is learning what love means.   
  
Love feels like the faces of his entire extended family and all of his friends beaming proudly at him on the other side of the glass. Love feels like his dad’s strong hands on his back and on his wrist, and his dad’s proud grin when Sebastian walks into the water.   
  
It feels like white fabric clinging to his legs, and his mom’s teary-eyed smile when she gives him his first real tie. It feels like cake at his house and people patting him on the back, and it’s heavy like the set of books that is pressed into his hands.   
  
It feels like his name, gold engraved in blue, and his name announced over the pulpit on Sunday, and it feels like relief from a baptism that allows him to wipe his slate clean.   
  
It feels like a boy moving in across the street from Sebastian’s house, and it’s warm like the cookies he helps his mom bake to deliver to their new neighbors. It is infectious, when the boy smiles at Sebastian, and it is everything in between.   
  
  


  
  


xi.

  
He is eleven years old, and he doesn’t know what love means.   
  
He doesn’t have a crush on any of the girls in his grade—he doesn’t understand why his friends tease him about this fact. There are girls that giggle when he walks by, and girls who blush when he smiles at them. But there’s a boy across the courtyard, a grade above Sebastian, who doesn’t say anything but is always found with a book in his hand, and Sebastian is infatuated with him.   
  
He is eleven years old when he first hears the word ‘gay’.   
  
“But what’s it mean?” he asks his dad, before he can slip out the door to go to whatever meetings he has for the night.   
  
His dad falters. He crouches down to Sebastian’s level and grabs both of Sebastian’s shoulders in his hand, and he says, “It’s a word that describes boys who are attracted to other boys.”   
  
“My friends called me gay,” Sebastian tells him. The word tastes funny in his mouth-unfamiliar. Something that might fit, if he let it. His father’s mouth curls unpleasantly.   
  
“They were just teasing,” his father says reassuringly. His hands comb through Sebastian’s hair. “You aren’t like—you’re normal, Sebby, you don’t have to worry about that. It’s just something friends say sometimes.”   
  
Sebastian frowns. “You say it like it’s not normal for boys to like other boys.”   
  
He is eleven, and he is far too smart for his age. His father’s mouth curls again, and his eyebrows furrow, but he doesn’t say anything as he stands back up and brushes off the legs of his dress pants. “I have to get to the church,” he says firmly. “I’ll see you tomorrow, son. Don’t forget to practice your hymns tonight, okay?”   
  
He doesn’t know what love means. Perhaps it’s the way his heart expands and swells when he plays the piano—other songs, once he finishes his hymns, songs that make Lizzie dance around the room. He thinks it might be the way his father tried to reassure him tonight, even though it doesn’t feel right.   
  
It is still the way he feels when he prays. His Heavenly Father loves him despite the confusion Sebastian is feeling right now, and it feels unconditional.   
  
  


  
  


xiii.   
  
He is thirteen years old, and he knows what a crush feels like.   
  
Not a playground crush, and not a celebrity crush. A crush that makes you smile when you think about them, that makes your cheeks darken and your hands a little bit sweaty. A crush that makes your heart skip a beat or two when they speak. The kind of crush whose name you pair with yours, in the hopes that it’ll sound natural and perfect and right.   
  
This crush is a boy in Sebastian’s stake, and they meet at a dance.   
  
They meet by the drinking fountain; it’s Halloween. Inside the church gym there are corny decorations and a snack bar that has since been reduced to Swedish fish and a few straggler M&M’s. It’s quieter in the hallway, just barely. Sebastian is a Ghostbuster, and Dallin a superhero, and they spend the night laughing as they dance along to every corny song they can and dodging all of the slow songs.   
  
Dallin goes to his school, but Sebastian doesn’t get to see him often.   
  
He is thirteen and he goes to every stake activity the church holds, and Dallin is always there, and they always sit side by side. Sebastian does his best not to erupt into goosebumps every time Dallin’s arm brushes against his, and Dallin uses every trick in the book to get Sebastian to laugh.   
  
If given time, Sebastian thinks this could be love.   
  
Service projects and stake dances and basketball practices and temple trips do little to prepare Sebastian for what comes next. In the scheme of things, he knows these things are preparing him for a greater role in life. That’s what his father always says, anyway. But they do little to prepare him for heartbreak.    
  
Dallin stops coming to stake activities, and Sebastian hears from mutual friends that he stops going to youth activities altogether. Sebastian doesn’t see him at school, less often now as he’s actively looking for him. When he finally finds Dallin, it’s under the bleachers during gym class and Dallin’s hand is up the shirt of a girl a year ahead of them.   
  
It stings, fast and quick, and it feels like heartbreak and betrayal.   
  
He feels tricked by Dallin, cheap. Dallin who became inactive and who has no problem kissing girls and touching girls—his stomach cuddles and lurches painfully, and he blames it on Dallin breaking promises to God.   
  
The aftermath feels like a need to throw himself into work, so Sebastian does. He arranges service projects, he reads his scriptures dutifully, he goes to the temple weekly with his mom and he prays daily with his dad. When his dad arranges a time for Sebastian to meet with him as the bishop, he’s sure he’s somehow been caught.   
  
But the bishop—his dad, and those same strong hands—give him a calling, and Sebastian grows determined to fulfill it. He finds glory in his hard work, and satisfaction in helping others come to church.   
  
His father smiles proudly at him, and he nearly forgets altogether what heartbreak feels like.   
  


  
  


  
xiv.

  
He is fourteen years old, and he knows what responsibility looks like.   
  
He is sat down by his parents and told that he has finally reached the age where it’s important he start saving for his mission.  _ His mission, _ the lucrative and evasive promise he’s been hearing ever since he was old enough to understand it—and now it seems closer than ever before. When he is doubtful, his father instructs him to pray. His mother kisses the top of his head and tells him that he’ll get there eventually. A mission is his higher purpose; he must find it within himself to desire to go.   
  
“Heavenly Father,” he begins, head bowed, hands clasped. He begins and it feels like fraud, so he purses his lips and shakes his head and he starts again. “I know this is the path of righteousness,” he says slowly. “This is the best way for me to help others find their way to the church. The best way to help people. But is it something I can even do? People like me—”   
  
His voice catches in his throat. People like him don’t usually get chances in the church. It feels silly to get down on his knees and ask God for a sign that going on a mission to make his parents proud is the right thing to do. Shouldn’t he want to go out of the goodness of his heart, out of a desire to help others find peace?   
  
Something warm and reassuring spreads in his heart. Sebastian feels calm—he didn’t even finish his prayer. It’s a quiet reassurance, that things are going to be okay. There’s a lot about this world that he doesn’t know but his father taught him how to recognize God’s counsel when it comes, and Sebastian takes this calmness as the reassurance he needed.   
  
He feels that love, when he prays. The unconditional love they talk about over the pulpit, the grace written into the scriptures. When he prays, he feels like God’s son, and it’s enough.   
  
He is fourteen years old and he knows what responsibility feels like. There are eyes on him and hopes placed on him and expectations he’ll be required to reach simply because he is the son of the bishop. Responsibility is no longer holding his sister’s hand through sacrament meeting. It is no longer doing the dishes without being asked. It is a devotion to God and the expectation of the congregation and it is everything in between.   
  
  


  
  


xvi. 

 

He is sixteen years old, and he knows what hatred is.

 

Hatred is driving through Salt Lake City on the first Saturday of June and hearing his father snarl nasty remarks about the traffic and its cause. It’s driving through by a crowd of marching people in their most colorful attire, people who hold the hands of the people they love like gender doesn’t matter and it’s seeing people at the edges of the crowd holding signs with condemning words. This is a time for celebration but there is still unfiltered hate and anger and fear.

 

“Ridiculous,” his father mutters. “Disgusting. We don’t need to see this—this  _ lifestyle _ forced in our faces. In our  _ children’s _ faces. Can’t they celebrate in private?”

 

“Shh,” his mother whispers, and her eyes dart back to Sebastian. He makes a conscious effort to look as though he’s not listening. “Wait until we’re home, dear.”

 

“We won’t be home for hours at this point, look at the traffic,” his father complains. Sebastian’s jaw locks. Outside his window, two men in rainbow colored bandanas kiss in front of a woman welding a cruel sign.

 

_ God doesn’t love you,  _ says the sign.

 

_ God will forsake you,  _ says the sermons.

 

In Sebastian’s heart, God says,  _ I still love you, my son. _

 

“Despicable,” his father snaps. His mother holds his hand.

 

He is sixteen years old, and he knows what hatred is. It’s anger at people you don’t even know, and it’s the sour way his father’s mouth curves down. It’s the way his mother stares at her lap instead of looking out the window, and it’s the way Sebastian feels relief when he realizes his siblings are asleep and not seeing this. It’s frustration at a God who allows His followers to believe a person is a sin because of who they choose to love.

 

It’s the way his stomach sinks like a glacier and spreads through his veins, until his entire body is filled with ice cold fear and a desire to punch something when he sees the way his father scowls at anyone they pass.

 

He is only a boy, and three days ago he went on his very first date, and Grace Smith kissed him on her doorstep and he still hasn’t called her again. He is only a boy and he hasn’t known love yet, not really, but he knows hate deep in his bones and in the tips of his fingers and it resides along his spine.

 

There’s a lingering hatred he’s starting to know—one that makes him sick to his stomach, one that makes him clutch his pillow at night and squeeze his eyes shut so the tears don’t fall, one that makes him recoil at his reflection in the mirror. One that brings him to his knees more times than he can count, begging his Heavenly Father to take away the pain and anguish he feels when his church forsakes people, to reassure him that he’s still loved regardless of how he feels.

 

It’s not quite self-hate, but it feels pretty close.

 

He is only sixteen, and he should not know these things.

  
  
  
  


xvii.

 

He is seventeen years old, and he knows what pain feels like.

 

Pain is spraining his ankle during the last big soccer game of the season. It’s the burn that comes from icing the injury too long, the sting before the relief. It’s the disappointment that bubbles in his chest when his team scores the winning goal and when they celebrate without him. 

 

It is the ache that builds inside him with Lizzie comes home in tears, still seeking out his comfort even after all these years, and cries about a solo she didn’t get. It’s the way his arms holding her aren’t enough anymore.

 

It is a pressure that builds, when he looks out at the world and sees trial and suffering, and humanity and grace. It is unexplainable, and it is the truest emotion he has felt.

 

It’s the way he has to write, the way the words bleed from his fingers, the way he frames narratives and forges characters and feels everything they feel. It is the way he doesn’t write his true story, and it is the way his eyes burn and his hands ache when he thinks about the words he really wants to say.

 

It is the boy who stands at his locker across the hall, a year younger and quiet, whose shoulders drop when people approach him. It’s the way his eyes go tight when they invite him to church activities, and it’s the bite in his responses when he declines. It’s the way Sebastian can’t stop watching him, no matter what how hard he tries. It is a craving, and it is need and it is fear.

 

It is his desire to ease the pain of others while having no idea how to ease his own.

 

He is seventeen years old, and he wonders when the world gets better.

  
  
  
  


xviii.

 

He is eighteen years old, and he is relearning what excitement is.

 

There’s a book deal, an offer that comes a few days after his birthday. There’s talks of a tour. He is young and he is handsome and he is a bishop’s son, and he wrote a book that said only half the things he truly felt but told a fantastical story. Sebastian Brother, the boy who wrote an entire novel during a four month period of school his senior year, and who became wildly famous because of it.

 

There’s talks of pushing his mission back a few months—a book tour and a deal with a publisher to continually release books is deemed more important. Sebastian doesn’t have it within him to feel bitter; he spent years being told that the most important thing he would do would be to serve a mission, but that’s changed. He’ll still go, he’s reassured, like a few extra months spent at his home is such a burden. He’ll do some college and edit the book and he’ll do a tour and that’s that.

 

The excitement builds, when he lets it. His dream, his second deepest-harbored secret finally coming to life. He’ll be  _ published,  _ his name will have value. He will be Sebastian Brother for the first time in years, and not just Bishop Brother’s son. Excitement is nerves and it’s anticipation, and it’s the way Sebastian can look at himself in the mirror most of the time without cringing. It’s being able to feel pride, or something similar, for the first time in his life.

  
  
  
  


xix.

 

He is nineteen years old, and he is feeling an emotion he has never felt before.

 

He calls it Tanner, since its’ namesake is what brought it on, and it’s  _ thrilling _ . 

 

It’s catching eyes across a classroom and it’s the adrenaline rush that comes from the secret. It’s Tanner’s blush when Sebastian teases him, it’s Tanner’s laugh, it’s his smile. It’s the burn in his throat from a hike and it’s the breath taken from his lungs when Tanner kisses him. It’s straddling the line between euphoria and heartbreak, and it’s unsurmountable fear.

 

“Are you my boyfriend?” he pants into Tanner’s mouth.  _ This is what it feels like.  _ It’s not giving Tanner a second to respond because Sebastian feels like he’s drowning unless he’s kissing Tanner, and it’s a sudden burst of bravery that makes him move his hand lower, lower.

 

It’s pleasure, almost, and it’s ice cold terror, and it’s Tanner’s reassuring hands on his bare skin. Always Tanner’s hands, always—when they hold a pencil, when they curl over the keys of his laptop, when they’re tangled in Sebastian’s hair. Roaming, exploring, pressing, holding. It’s Tanner, all of him, and it is intoxicating.

 

He is standing at the edge of a cliff—or maybe he’s falling. And he’s not sure what part of his life is waiting for him at the bottom and what he’s leaving behind up above. 

 

It feels different, when he thinks too much about it. Tanner feels tainted, destined to fail, and Sebastian feels like he’s been manipulating Tanner this whole time.

 

_ I’m not gay,  _ he tells himself. He’s deceiving Tanner because he’s not gay.  _ I’m not I’m not I’m not.  _ The feeling turns from thrill and anticipation to guilt and anxieties. For Tanner, Sebastian would try to be that person—the one he denies being. Maybe it would be easier. Maybe it makes everything worse.

 

He is nineteen years old, and the feeling he couldn’t find the words to describe is longing.

  
  
  
  


xix.

 

He is still nineteen years old, and for the first time he is feeling hope in its purest form. 

  
  
  
  


xx.

 

He is twenty years old, and he is learning the real definition of redemption.

 

Days are hard and nights are long, and there are often times he can’t find the strength to get out of bed. There is no easy fix. There is no simple way to navigate this life when everything you knew turned on its axis. There’s an internal clock inside him that still wakes him up at 7am in Sundays and eases him out of bed and onto the floor to pray. It happens during the week, too; Tanner has often woken to a bed that’s shaking underneath Sebastian’s hands and strangled cries. He tries coffee once, when Tanner asks him if he’d like to, and the taste is fine but it’s the act that makes him recoil and spit it up. He tenses every time they drive past a church building, and his hands tremble if someone says the word mission. The road to happiness is not easy, he’s learning, but the path to redemption is.

 

He speaks most often to his sister. His father, ashamed and embarrassed even after a year, still has nothing to say to him. He receives letters from his mom—he saves the ones about his family and Tanner burns the passive aggressive ones about transgressions and repentance. He makes friends with Tanner’s friends, and with the lady who bags his groceries, and with their elderly neighbor across the hall.

 

Redemption, he’s learning, is not a sip of water and a bite of bread administered on Sunday afternoons. It is not the heartbreak and anguish he expected to feel. It is finding the courage to pray, even as he cries. It is Tanner’s hands, as it always is, clasped tightly and his head bowed as he joins Sebastian when it is needed. It’s waking up to sunlight streaming through the curtains, and it’s Tanner’s smile being the first thing to greet him in the mornings.

 

But most importantly it’s words of affirmation that he writes on his mirror. It’s the way he loses his smile, the old one, the mask, and it’s the way he remembers what it’s like to smile without any inhibitions. It’s writing the book  _ he  _ wants to write, and it’s finding out that his biggest fan holds his hand at dinner time and it’s enough. It’s walks in the Palo Alto air and it’s hikes through Provo canyons and it’s trying pizza at every place he travels to so he can tell Tanner which one is the best.

 

It is learning to love himself, and it is learning how to love others in a way that feels similar to before. Similar, but freer.

 

It’s not quite, but redemption feels a lot like happiness.

  
  
  
  


xxii.

 

He is twenty-two years old, and he knows what pride is.

 

It’s the excited shout that bursts out of him when Tanner tells him the news, and it’s the emotion that overcomes him so strongly he practically tackles Tanner to the ground. It’s the swelling in his heart and in his lungs that makes his eyes fill with tears, happy tears, because Tanner got a  _ book deal  _ and Sebastian is in love with him. It’s Tanner’s boisterous, flustered laugh when Sebastian kisses every inch of his face at the news.

 

It’s a letter he receives in the mail from his sister, and it’s the invitation to her first college stage performance, and it’s an hour long phone call full of tears and stories and the weight of Tanner’s hand in his throughout the whole thing.

 

It’s Tanner’s gentle hands on his face, carefully painting, and it’s a rainbow colored shirt and glitter in Tanner’s hair and the gleeful cheers of a celebration throughout an entire city. It’s the fading memory of a Pride six years ago, and it’s nothing but smiling faces and support today.

 

It’s the weight of an engagement ring in his pocket.

 

It’s the way he feels when he comes home, to the apartment he shares with Tanner—to the home they built with time and love. It’s his book on the shelf, and the unfinished sequel next to it, and the manuscript for the book he wants to share and it’s that same old battered, dog-eared, tear-stained first printed copy of Tanner and Sebastian’s love story. It’s omelets in the morning and cups of hot chocolate during the winter time and it’s deadlines and checklists and a busy schedule.

 

It’s pride in himself, too. His ability to look in the mirror now and love what he sees. The way he can hold Tanner’s hand now, without fear, and the way that he no longer cries when he prays. It’s in the way he found balance between being gay and loving God, and in the realization and the acceptance that he could be both things at once.

  
  
  
  


xxvi.

 

He is twenty-five years old, and he knows what happiness is.

 

It’s his husband and his smile, and the way he still blushes every time Sebastian teases him. It’s the first house they buy, a tiny inconsequential thing, and the garden Sebastian grows. It’s a mantel filled with their books—their first books, and the first books that matter.

 

(Tanner had kissed him softly when Sebastian pulled the hardcover copy of his newest book out of the box it was shipped in. His story, in his words. “This isn’t your first book,” he whispers to Sebastian, “but it’s your first real one.”

 

An echo, a memory, their very first kiss so many years ago. It makes Sebastian smile, and later—it makes him cry. Overwhelmed and full of happiness.)

 

It’s the Post-It notes Tanner leaves around the house for him to find, reminders to buy more milk or that Tanner is still hopelessly in love with Sebastian.

 

It’s their morning hikes, and it’s Sebastian’s cup of tea in the evenings. It’s sitting in the pews of a church that isn’t the one he used to know but feels pretty similar. It’s stargazing with Tanner and it’s book tours that turn into road trips and it’s the bright, terrified way Tanner’s eyes look when he tells Sebastian he’s been thinking about children and how he’s finally ready.

 

It’s Tanner’s hands, holding their newborn. It’s the way Tanner’s head bows as he cries. It’s their baby’s name, gold engraved on blue on an announcement they send to everyone they know. It’s cake and celebration and it’s a voicemail from his mother who congratulates Sebastian and his husband with a shaky voice. It’s a yellow nursery and a mobile and a rocking chair in the corner and it’s his kid’s fingers wrapped around his thumb and it’s an infinite desire to love, with everything inside of him.

 

Happiness is a life that he built himself, out of the rubble of fears and anxieties he never thought he’d overcome. It is Tanner’s never-ending support and adoration, and it is the way that Sebastian crawls into bed every night and nearly weeps with gratitude about where he is today. It is going to bed with a smile and waking up every morning to Tanner kissing him, and it is the hardships they endure and it is the highest feeling Sebastian has ever felt in his life.

 

He is twenty-five, he is twenty-seven, he is thirty, he is forty-one, and he is happy. Tanner is an excellent father, and Sebastian loves him more than he thought was possible. He loves his children, in all their rambunctious energy. He loves the dog they adopt, and he loves tending to his garden, and he loves the vacations he takes his family on.

 

Sebastian  _ loves, _ and he still feels, and every day he learns a new emotion and it is everything he wanted.

 

He is still at the edge of the cliff but he is no longer afraid of falling.

  
  
  
  


xli

 

He is sixty-one years old, and Sebastian Brother knows what love means. 

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me [here](https://tonytangredis.tumblr.com/).
> 
> comment, kudos, bookmark below!


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